(Updated May 13)
ELY – The coronavirus has hit Ely. An employee of the Dairy Queen store here tested positive for COVID-19 on Sunday, May 10.
According to owner Paul Ivancich, the employee had not been in the local restaurant since May 4.
“All of our 14 employees were tested just this morning at Ely-Bloomenson Community Hospital and we will have full results in two or three days,” he told the Timberjay on Monday, May 11.
Test results came back on Tuesday, May 12, and all the other Dairy Queen employees have tested negative.
The store has been closed to the public for indoor seating since Gov. Walz issued a state-wide stay-at-home order in March. Only the drive-thru at the fast-food restaurant has remained open.
In an email, Ivancich said, “On Sunday night, May 10, we were notified that one of our employees has tested positive for COVID-19. The employee’s last shift was on May 4. As of 10:45 a.m. on Monday morning, all employees have been notified and tested for COVID-19 locally with the help of EBCH and Essential Health.”
“The restaurant was immediately closed for deep cleaning. Our highest priority is the health and well-being of our employees and guests and we are following CDC and MDH guidelines,” Ivancich said.
Since the state closure order, all Ely DQ employees have been required to wear gloves and face coverings.
“We change our gloves every half hour and wash our hands hourly,” Ivancich said. “Our goal has been to be as safe for our community as possible.”
The Ely DQ Grill and Chill will reopen upon consultation of medical providers, he said.
“We thank you for your support during this difficult time.”
According to a press release from Ely-Bloomenson Community Hospital, the facility assisted in testing 15 asymptomatic employees of the Ely DQ Grill and Chill.
“To reduce the hardship on families and eliminate the need to travel for testing, EBCH was able to quickly formulate a plan to collect the samples safely and confidentially at our facility and send them out for analysis,” Communications Director Jodi Martin said.
“Although EBCH does not currently have an established COVID testing clinic, it was vital for us to meet the needs of the community during this isolated incident,” she said.
The Minnesota Department of Health will follow-up on all positive cases and use their tracing protocols, according to Martin.
“The critical thing to remember at this time is to follow all of the ongoing safety precautions. Should you experience COVID-19 symptoms such as cough, fever, and shortness of breath, you should contact your primary care provider for further instructions,” she said.
According to Jon Erickson, executive director of the Ely Community Health Center, the coronavirus continues to spread around the world.
“We now have over 4.2 million reported cases worldwide with over 288,000 reported deaths as of Tuesday morning,” he said. “In Minnesota we have had almost 12,500 reported cases with 614 reported deaths. In Saint Louis County we have had 96 reported cases, with 12 reported deaths, including the one reported case here in Ely.”
Prevent the spread
The COVID-19 virus is extremely contagious, Erickson said.
“Thus it is extremely important that you follow the basic advice from the CDC which is always wear a face mask when out in public, especially where physical distancing is not possible or reasonable,” he said.
• Wash your hands for at least 20 seconds several times a day or use a hand sanitizer with at least 60 percent alcohol if soap and water are not available.
• Disinfect frequently touched surfaces in your residence including things like door handles.
• Avoid close contact with people who are sick.
• Stay at home if you have symptoms except to get medical evaluation or treatment.
• Cover coughs and sneezes with a tissue or the inside of your elbow.
“Remember we are in the current Stay-at-Home executive order until May 18, unless the executive order is extended or modified by Gov. Walz,” he said. “This means you should only leave your house for essential services like grocery shopping, medical care or exercise. The dreaded second wave may strike all too soon.”
Many states are starting to reopen their economies, hoping to ease the economic pain brought on by pandemic-fighting restrictions.
“Doing this before meeting even minimal criteria for a safe reopening as prescribed by the CDC is a recipe for disaster,” Erickson said. “As a result, the much-feared second wave of infection may not wait until autumn, which is what many scientists had been forecasting. Premature, scattershot reopening by states without coordination between various regions may instead bring on a storm of a wave breaking unpredictably across the country complicated by the normal seasonal outbreak of the flu.”
Tracking the spread
To halt the spread of COVID-19 as states reopen, a network of contact tracers will be required.
“People are trained to track and notify possibly infected individuals and map their exposures to others,” he said.
The goal of tracking and tracing the contacts of every infected person remains very far out of reach in the U.S., Erickson said.
“To keep up, the country would need 30 or 40 times as many trained contact tracers it has now,” he said. “We are going to be seeing and hearing a lot about contact tracers in our community in the near future and there may be opportunities for you to help volunteer to assist the county with this important activity.
“As you will see, the importance of people sharing who they have been in contact with and following up with the county public health department is critical to our controlling this virus,” Erickson said.
For questions or comments, contact Erickson at director@elycommunityhealth.org or 218-365-5678.